In New York, concrete jungle where dreams are made of...

Ok so maybe we weren't actually in the city - although if you ask Steve we were on Long Island which is part of NYC. I don't buy it. He gave me some sort of explanation that I can't remember. Either way, we were on Long Island at the end of January for a family wedding.

Best wedding ever. Best weekend ever. Seriously. So. Much. Fun.

We left the day after the ThunderSnow because we hadn't spent enough time in the car. I got up Thursday morning, worked for a few hours, got ready, finished packing, and we hit the road. Steve was anxious to get moving because he figured we'd be on LI just in time for evening rush hour. Which, apparently, is terrible. I didn't really want to experience that, but that just means we should have left first thing in the morning. We got on the road about 1 and we usually go up 95 but from our new house we went up a different way. We managed to make it through 6 states in 6 hours. (Less time than my trip home in the thundersnow. Which I'm pretty sure I pointed out all weekend long.) Our drive was relatively uneventful, and due to all that snow, LI had closed all the schools so we didn't even hit traffic there. It was nice.

We got up there Thursday nights and headed to Steve's aunts house. It was nice to see her. It's been really long. And we also got a chance to see the groom! We just sat around and talked for a while. We really had only planned on stopping by for a quick visit cause we'd see them the next day but we're chatty so we were there for a while. Lonnie's also getting in to making rice pudding so we had a tasting! I'd never really had rice pudding so I was trying something new! woo! It wasn't great - texture-wise - but taste-wise it was really good. I liked the orange dream one the best. After visiting for a while Steve and I headed to our hotel to crash.

Except we totally didn't do that when we got there. He turned on the tv and then started complaining about how hungry he was. We hadn't eaten dinner. Just some snacks and rice pudding at Baba's! We'd seen a McDonald's across the street so we headed there. Unfortunately, it was closed. So we went to the Diner next door. Steve had really wanted to go there, but I was hoping for something quicker and went for McD's. Stupid non-24 hour McD's! I had matzo ball soup and Steve got breakfast. I was really excited about my soup, because I'd been wanting some for a while and I'd been feeling kind of sick the last couple days. It was going to be soooo good. It wasn't. It was a HUGE disappointment. The matzo balls were weird and had no flavor. The chicken soup was super salty. All around. Not a good choice. After that it was back to the room and bed!

Friday we got up early and headed to Baba's for breakfast! We went to a bagel shop near by and had the most amazing breakfast!! Everything bagel, cream cheese, onions, tomatoes, and lox! I want some right now! Breakfast was nice and it was good to get to spend some more quality time with Baba because it'd been a really long time since either of us had seen her. After breakfast we dropped Baba off and headed to the outlets for this girl to get some shoes for the wedding. I didn't really have any formal-fancy type shoes that would go well with my dress so I needed to buy some. Even though we went to the outlet for me to get 1 pair of shoes we ended up leaving with a belt for Steve (and btw, are belts really supposed to cost $25 ON SALE?!) and we had put shoes on hold for Steve at another store near where we were having lunch. I'm not sure how that worked out, but Steve kind of made out here haha.

We headed to lunch with Debbie after our little shopping adventure. We went to this most amazing Italian place. The food was soooo good. I had an eggplant parm sub and a chopped salad. And it was SO MUCH FOOD! I didn't end up eating much, but Steve was surely happy to finish off my eggplant haha. We sat around at lunch for a couple hours. After lunch we still had to go pick up Steve's shoes. That was pretty quick trip even though I really wanted to walk around that outlet mall because it looked cool. We needed to get to the hotel and get ready for the Rehearsal Dinner. (Seriously, our whole trip revolved around food lol!)

The Rehearsal Dinner was a lot of fun. We finally got to meet Lonnie's bride! I can't believe we've been so busy that we really hadn't met her until the day before the wedding!!! She was super sweet and they look so good together. The dinner was a good time. We sat around and talked and caught up with everyone. We had like a gazillion courses of food. All of it amazing. I left out of there feeling more stuffed than I've ever been haha. It ended pretty late and we were ready to head back to the room and chill out for a bit (and for me? hit the hay. I was tired!)

Wedding day was busy and full of runnings around! Steve and I got up in the morning because we needed to go shopping. Again. We ran out of time on Friday so we headed to Target for a quick trip. And then back to the hotel to scoop up Heather. And then straight to the hair salon where Margot, Mel, and Baba were getting their hair done. First? Starbucks! We were tired! After they were finished at the salon we headed to All American! For the best food ever. I had a hot dog - which is not the traditional order from there because their burgers are amazing but I love hot dogs haha. Steve, Mel, and Heather got double-doubles. Heather was impressed with the food - she'd never had it before. And of course? ONION RINGS! OMG. They are amazing! I'm so glad we stopped.

After lunch it was back to the hotel. I napped. Glorious haha. After I got up Steve laid down which made my afternoon annoying. I needed to paint my nails for the wedding and he was sleeping and had to have all the lights out! I had to wheel the desk chair in to the bathroom so I could paint my nails. It was kind of funny, but mostly annoying.

We were all ready to head to the wedding around 5:40 so we headed out to meet the shuttle. That was supposed to be there at 5:45. It didn't show up until 6. When the wedding was supposed to start. Luckily, they weren't ready and they pushed it back to about 6:30. But when we finally got to the club they were shuffling us in to the ceremony room....we barely made it because of that stupid shuttle driver! There were plenty of complaints about that!

The ceremony was beautiful. Everyone looked great. It was full of love and it was just beautiful. Steve and I kept stealing sideways glances every time they talked about the vows and I know I was remembering the one's we'd said to each other and I'm thinking he was too ;)

The cocktail hour. OMG. The food. There were like 4 carving stations - paella (another new food for me!), shrimp, oysters on the half shell, rack of lamb, meat skewers, and a fried seafood table. Then the passed apps too. I saw mini-burgers, sushi, fried risotto, more shrimp, more meat, and a couple other things. Seriously we were stuffed before we headed in to the reception!

Which was equally as amazing! We walked in and the band was already going! This was going to be a celebration of celebrations! They actually had to clear the dance floor so they could announce the bride and groom! They went straight in to their first dance and then we all started dancing again. They did their mingle thing for a while, and everyone was still dancing! We'd sat down to have dinner apps and to order our main course. Before we could eat though Steve had to say the Jewish blessing of the bread. He was really nervous, but he did a great job!

The whole night consisted of dancing, food, family, friends, and great fun. It was really an amazing evening and Steve and I both said we'd never had so much fun at a wedding (and if you were at our wedding you know how much fun that was....this one? way beats that!)

We were sad to head home the next day. So we stopped for bagels first haha. Plus we needed to eat so we had one more Everything bagel, cream cheese, tomatoes, onions, and lox! Another amazing meal to cap off our trip full of food! We grabbed some bagels for us to freeze and we headed home.

Mostly uneventful ride. Took us a little less time to get home because we were leaving from a different part of LI but we were home around 5 and with plenty of time to unwind after spending hours in the car!

The whole trip was really great. Really fast. I can't wait to go back. We're planning a summer trip with a little more time and no big events so we can actually visit with everyone like we'd like to! Plus? Summer and free time. He's taking me to NYC if I have to drag his butt there haha.